Photo of the Week: Yoda the farm cat oversees lambing
Yoda the farm cat – so called because her ears stuck out flat when she was a kitten – loves nothing more than keeping an eye on things at lambing time.
The one-year-old is a great mouser, “which is just what we need on the farm”, says Anna-Marie Hendry, who uploaded the photo to the FW gallery.
See also: Photo of the Week: Whopper lamb weighs in at 8.5kg
“Yoda and her two brothers were feral kittens born at a local stable yard,” explains Anna-Marie, who works for HF & JH Glover and lives on-site at the firm’s main livestock yard at Hartley Manor Farm, Kent.
“I kept them in a large cage in a shed until they were neutered and old enough to run loose.
“They became very friendly during that time, would come into my house, sometimes share a bed with Nellie my elderly bulldog, and they all love to have a fuss made of them.”
Yoda enjoys spending time with the farm’s shepherdess Ruby Sarsam and herdswoman Sarah May.
“She is often found hitching a ride in the Manitou with Sarah, or riding across the fields in the jeep to check on the sheep with Ruby,” says Anna-Marie.
Yoda especially loves lambing time. “She checks out the milk for the bottle-fed lambs, rides round the barns on Ruby’s shoulders, or is tucked up inside her jumper.
© Sarah May
“When she isn’t catching mice and rats, she happily adopts lambs, helps to fill the hay racks [as in the picture] and generally supervises everything the girls do.
“On chilly days, she can be found tucked up with the piglets under the heat lamps. She has truly made the farm her own,” adds Anna-Marie.
The farm has 300 breeding ewes, mostly North Country Mules and Suffolk Mules, and has lambed roughly 190 of them so far.
The Glover family has been at Hartley Bottom Farm since 1912. Roy Glover, now 84, is the third generation on the farm, and still works long hours, seven days a week, in partnership with his two sons.
As well as the sheep, the mixed farm rears cattle and pigs and grows wheat, oats, barley, oilseed rape and feed beans.
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We also have a 2026 Lambing gallery
